Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or any of its characters.

Ding Dong Ditch

...

At lunch time, Sam crossed the school's cafeteria towards her usual table. Tucker was already sitting there, his brows furrowed in concentration. She took a seat, but he was still oblivious to her presence. Because of that, she stood up and sat back down, purposely moving the table.

No reaction.

"Jeez, Tuck." Upon her speaking, he glanced up at her, appearing surprised. "What are you thinking so hard about?"

His surprised expression melted and was immediately replaced by a look of defeat. "Do you remember that prank I recorded three weeks ago?" he asked her. She paused and took a moment to recall that and, once she did, she frowned.

"Oh, when you put all those paper cups filled with water in my room and then stapled them together?" When Tucker nodded, she snorted. "Then yeah. How could I forget that? I've never been so irritated in my life."

The techno-geek chuckled, but once Sam glared at him, he stopped laughing and coughed. "Anyway," he continued, "I uploaded that video to the internet recently." Before the Goth could voice her disapproval, he raised a hand to her. "People like it. They want more prank-related content."

"So, people like your videos?" Sam grabbed her lunch from her backpack and started shaking her head. "Wow. That must be so hard for you."

Tucker glared softly at her. "You know, I could do without the sarcasm."

Danny approached their table just then, carrying his lunch tray with a small smile. "Hey, guys," he greeted, taking a seat beside Tucker. "Did I miss anything?"

"No," Sam answered, twirling her apple around in her hands. "Well, unless you count Tucker complaining about people liking his online video as missing anything."

"Huh?" Danny's gaze swung over to the mentioned boy, who was now busy stuffing his pepperoni pizza slice into his mouth. "What's she talking about? What online video?"

Sam glanced over at Tucker with a grimace etched on her face. "Please swallow your food before you explain."

He obeyed, swallowing his food and dropping his crust onto his tray. "Basically, I pranked Sam two weeks ago and managed to record it. I uploaded it online recently and people thought it was funny. The problem is, I want to keep them entertained. I mean, I could become an internet star and meet other stars!"

"You want to see stars? Prank me like that again and I'll hit you hard enough to get you that dream," Sam threatened, her mood slightly wilting as memories of that prank resurfaced. Tucker gulped, staring at her for a few seconds before turning to Danny.

"Okay, so it looks like I won't be pranking her anymore." A Cheshire cat-like grin then crept onto his lips as he eyed his half-hybrid best friend. "Unless you'd be willing to be my prank dummy."

"No, thanks. I'm already the A-lister's punching bag," Danny grumbled, grabbing a handful of his fries. "I'll pass."

Tucker's hopeful expression deflated instantly. His head dropped onto the table and he began to grumble underneath his breath. "I'm doomed, then. It's not like I have any other friends to prank."

"Who said you needed friends in order to pull pranks?" Danny asked him. "I'm pretty sure everyone is subject to being pranked, whether they're a friend or not. Besides, pranks are better if they're pulled on strangers. Their reactions are more genuine."

Tucker's eyes widened after that and he lifted his head slightly. "That's true, but wait. What kind of prank should I pull, and on who?" he questioned. Danny shrugged, but Sam smirked.

"You can switch the lunch menu to something healthy, like veggie-tofu stir-fry," she suggested, her smirk broadening into a grin. "That's a great prank. I would definitely be upset."

Tucker and Danny both rolled their eyes at her. "What, so the lunch lady ghost can appear and summon a meat monster to attack us again?" Tucker then stopped, tapping his chin. "Actually, that wouldn't be a bad idea."

"You're right. That would be a terrible idea." Danny took another fry and began dragging it around his tray. "That wasn't a fun experience. Think harder. Come up with something better. Something simple."

And thinking harder Tucker did.

He thought all the way up until the bell rang, but his mind still came up blank. As he and his two friends walked through the hallway, he figured he'd think about it more during his next class, but then inspiration struck in the form of Dash and Kwan.

The two slowly crept up to Mr. Lancer's closed classroom door, banged on it twice, and then took off running like they were being chased by dogs. That finally gave Tucker an idea, so he turned to Danny and Sam.

"I have an idea!" he exclaimed, grinning from ear-to-ear. "Something simple."

Danny blinked. "What is it?"

Tucker opened his mouth to respond, but before he could get a word out, Mr. Lancer's classroom door flung open. Out stepped the teacher himself, his hands planted on his hips. His eyes swept around and landed on the trio, who each realized at the last minute that they were the only ones near the door.

"Tell us after we get detention for what Dash and Kwan just did," Sam murmured to Tucker, staring up at Mr. Lancer as he towered over them.

Sam didn't know what to expect when Tucker called her at quarter to nine in the evening, telling her to meet him at some random neighborhood near the park. It was chilly outside, so she threw on a jacket, grabbed her Fenton thermos, and set out to her destination.

She figured it had something to do with ghost hunting, as she was always called upon by Danny or Tucker to meet at random locations during the night. It was no surprise that she rushed to meet Tucker, mentally preparing herself for the impending ghost attack.

To her confusion, the neighborhood she arrived at was a normal one. There were no ghosts floating around and Danny didn't appear to be present. There wasn't any destruction or anything chaotic going on the way there usually was during their ghost battles.

She even spotted Tucker casually leaning against a light pole in the street and staring down at his PDA. Now curious, she shuffled over to him, calling out his name once she was at a close distance.

"What's this about?" she demanded, crossing her arms. He straightened up and grinned, sliding off his backpack. She watched him fish through it, but her curiosity remained in place. "Where's Danny?"

"He couldn't make it. Said something about his parents making him catch up on missed assignments." Tucker pulled out a handheld video camera from his backpack and handed it to Sam. "That's okay, though. I can just use you instead!"

"Wow. Don't I feel special," the girl muttered. As she eyed the camera in her hand, she chanced asking him, "So, if Danny isn't coming and there's no ghost attack, why are we standing in some random neighborhood at this time?"

"Well," the boy started, taking her thermos from her and sticking it in his bag, "remember earlier when Dash and Kwan knocked on Mr. Lancer's door and ran?"

Sam scoffed. "Yeah. I don't think I'll forget serving detention for it."

"That somehow gave me an idea," Tucker carried on, disregarding her remark. "Do you remember what Danny said earlier about doing something simple?"

"I think we've already established that I remember all these events," Sam growled, exasperation sweeping through her. "Can we please skip to the point of this?"

Tucker nodded, inhaling deeply. "I want to do a ding dong ditch prank compilation. We go to a few houses, ring the doorbell, run to a hiding spot, and then—"

"I know how ding dong ditch goes," Sam interjected, blinking and shaking her head slowly. "Tucker, I don't know if you forgot this, but we're fourteen. We may not be old enough to drive yet, but we're definitely old enough to not play something as stupid as this."

Tucker rolled his eyes and waved his hand through the air. "Oh, live a little, Sam. We're still young. Besides, it wouldn't be you ringing the door bell and all that jazz." He reached out and tapped the camera in her hand, smiling. "All you have to do is record it."

Sam sighed heavily. "Tucker, I—"

"Please," the techno geek drawled, closing his hands together and displaying his best puppy dog face. "I promise this won't take long. I'll even give you video credit if this video goes viral!"

Sam glared weakly at him before throwing up a hand in defeat. "Fine, but you owe me." She only agreed to it because she knew he could be filming something much worse, so the fact that he chose a harmless ding dong ditch prank was acceptable enough for her.

But was it really harmless?

The first house Tucker chose was a house further into the neighborhood. The porch lights were on and there was a single black car in the driveway in front of the garage. Sam positioned herself behind a bush on the other side of the house and discreetly aimed the camera at the doorstep.

Tucker crept up to the porch, pausing to turn around and wave to the camera. Sam glanced up at him from the camera's screen and rose an eyebrow. He whirled back around and tip-toed over to the front door, where he proceeded to pound on it five times.

Maybe it was the way he tore away from the porch so quickly, or maybe it was the exaggerated fashion that he purposely ran in, but Sam found herself chuckling. She recorded him as he ducked behind the car in the driveway, but as soon as the front door swung open, she panned the camera over there.

To her amusement, Kwan stepped out onto the porch, frantically looking around the yard. Sam made sure she and the camera stayed out of view, but he barely looked in her direction. After a minute, he retreated into the house, slamming the front door shut.

Neither she or Tucker dared to move right away, but once they did, they hastily snuck down the sidewalk. When they were at a good enough distance, they allowed themselves to laugh more audibly.

"Man, if that isn't karma for what happened earlier, then I don't know what is." Tucker recovered from his laughing fit and turned to Sam. "You got that on camera, right?"

"Duh. What else would I be doing?" she retorted, holding up the camera. "You'd better hope he doesn't find out it was you who did that."

"Eh. I'm not worried. In order to produce funny content, you have to be willing to make sacrifices."

"I hardly think ding dong ditch is funny content."

"But you just laughed." Tucker began walking backwards down the street, raising his hands to the back of his head. "Besides, this isn't just regular ding dong ditch. It's the Tucker edition."

Sam frowned. "Sounds boring." She followed after him, re-watching the footage she just captured. "How many houses do we have left? And how come you decided to do this late at night?"

"So we don't get caught in broad daylight," he replied, an unsaid 'duh' concealed within his tone. "I don't know how many houses we're going to do. I'd say a couple in this neighborhood and then a couple in the neighborhood over."

Sam pressed her lips together and peered over her shoulder. "Fine." She moved forward, lowering the camera. "Let's just get this over with. Don't forget we both have a curfew."

They ended up pranking three more houses on that street before moving over onto the next street. Every house on that block had its porch lights on, save for one house near the end of the street. That house caught Tucker's eye, prompting him to creep towards it.

There were two cars parked by this house: one was parked in the driveway while the other one was parked on the curb in front of the house. Sam hid behind the latter one while Tucker approached the porch.

He flashed the camera a thumbs up before raising his hand to the house's doorbell, pressing it a total of four times before darting for cover behind the car in the driveway. Sam zoomed in on the doorstep, waiting for someone to come out and react.

No one did.

She figured nobody was home, but that thought went away when she saw the porch light flicker on. She peeked over at Tucker, who was grinning and waiting for the same reaction that she was waiting for. Some time went by, but nobody came outside.

"That's weird," she heard her friend say to himself. "Maybe they didn't hear me."

"You rang the doorbell multiple times. Someone heard you. Plus, they turned on the porch light," she told him quietly. "They were probably just trying to scare you away."

She heard him scoff and watched as he stood up. "Nothing scares Tucker Foley, especially not humans. I mean, come on. We fight ghosts." He made his way back over to the porch, so Sam panned the camera over to him.

He rang the doorbell several more times before bolting back over to his original hiding spot. Again, nobody came out of the house, even after they waited a few minutes. Tucker huffed impatiently and looked over at Sam, who simply shrugged.

"Try knocking," she suggested. "Maybe that'll get you a response."

The boy nodded and made his way back up to the porch, noticeably less determined than he was before. Sam was about to cut off the camera since it was obvious that whoever was inside wasn't going to come out, but she saw something that stopped her from doing so.

As Tucker drew closer to the front door again, she caught the curtains being moved slightly from one of the house's front windows. Someone was standing there, no doubt waiting for the prankster to strike again.

Sam lowered the camera, her eyes widening as Tucker began pounding on the door. Almost instantly, the door flew open and out came a disheveled-looking man. Instead of yelling at Tucker, the first thing he did was grab ahold of the boy's wrist.

It wasn't until Sam realized that the man was trying to pull him inside that she chose to spring into action. "Hey!" she hollered, standing up from behind the car and giving away her position. "Let him go!"

That didn't work, as the man continued to tug Tucker towards him. The boy's panicked shouts made Sam's heart drop to her stomach. She sprinted across the yard and up the porch, stopping right in front of the man.

"I said let him go!" she repeated, much more harshly this time. Fortunately, she distracted the man enough for Tucker to be able to break out of his grasp, but unfortunately, the man set his sights on her instead.

"Is that a camera?" he demanded, glaring at the camera in her hand. She glanced down at it, having completely forgotten that she was still holding it. The man took a menacing step forward, prompting her to move back. "Did you record me?"

"Uh..." She was at a loss for words, but before she could even think of a way to react, the man snatched her by the front of her jacket and started to shake her. "Hey, get off of me!" she yelled, trying to pry his hands off of her.

"Let her go!" she heard Tucker shout, but she knew it was pointless. She was quick on her feet— literally. She kicked the man in his shin without a second thought, thankful for the fact that she threw on her hard combat boots that night.

With a painful grunt that satisfied her, the man released her, though he ended up pushing her off the porch and onto the ground in the process. She landed on her bottom, accidentally dropping the camera. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tucker grab it, but she paid him no mind otherwise.

The man, now furious, reached into his front pocket and tried to pull something out. Thanks to the porch light being on, Sam was able to catch the slight glint of a small knife.

"Tucker," she said, slowly scooting backwards while keeping her gaze trained on the weapon. In a flash, she scrambled to her feet, yelling out, "Tucker, run!" before taking off running herself.

She crossed the front yard and dashed down the street, most definitely fearing for her life. She heard a pair of heavy footsteps trailing behind her, but she guessed that it was just Tucker. Because of that, she didn't turn around to check until she was sure that they lost the guy.

Upon actually turning around, however, she was horrified to discover that it was the man himself, chasing her at a dangerously close distance. She gasped and picked up her speed, thankful that she was somewhat physically active.

Part of her wanted to make a U-turn to see if Tucker was okay, but she knew that he took off in the opposite direction. If she ran back that way now, she would've led the man to him, which wasn't a smart idea because he wasn't that fast and he had a backpack, as well as a camera, slowing him down.

She veered to the right and continued running in the general direction of the park. She thought he'd stop chasing her if they were in a more public setting. She was gradually running out of breath and could feel her chest burning, but she ignored it and pushed herself forward.

Once she got to the park, she decided to hide behind a tree because when she looked back, the man wasn't so close behind her anymore. She stood perfectly still, attempting to remain concealed. A few seconds after hiding, she dared herself to peek around the tree, only to witness the man searching for her.

"I know you're around here somewhere, little girl!" She saw his head craning around as he looked for her, but the very moment she saw his body swivel in her direction, she straightened up behind the tree.

She didn't dare move a muscle until she heard the crunching of leaves in the distance about half a minute later. She poked her head out from the tree and peered across the park, spotting the man further away than he originally was.

Unluckily for her, he was facing her direction, so when she shifted out of her hiding place, he caught her eye. "Hey, come here!" he yelled, flinging out his finger at her. Instead of doing that, she did the contrary by bolting in the opposite direction.

She moved down the sidewalk as fast as her almost-tired legs could carry her. She was so paranoid about the man catching up to her that, while running, she looked back over her shoulder. As a result, she tripped, falling onto her palms.

She happened to trip right beside an alley, so instead of continuing to run for her life, she scurried over there. She wanted to keep an eye on the entrance, so she more or so backed into the alley. As she backed up, a cold, gloved hand slid its way over her mouth.

"Shh, Sam," the person whispered before she could scream. She felt an arm curl around her waist, and it wasn't until she turned her head to the side that she found out it was Danny. He backed up with her, towing her behind the large dumpster.

They both remained silent, save for Sam's heavy panting that the Halfa tried to muffle. They heard an approaching set of footsteps up until it came to a halt at the entrance of the alley. Sam stiffened, which Danny must've picked up on because he tightened his grasp on her.

The shadow of feet lingered there, but not for long. They heard the man curse underneath his breath before darting away. Still, neither of them moved until they were sure the man was far enough away from the alley.

Danny retracted his arms from around Sam and gingerly grabbed her shoulders, making her look at him. "Are you okay? Are you hurt?" She shook her head, so he let her go. "Where's Tucker?"

"I don't know," she answered, keeping her voice down in case the man decided to make a detour. "We ran in two different directions. How'd you know I was here?"

"Tucker called me and told me you were probably heading in the direction of the park. Before I could ask where he was, the call dropped. I think his phone died. Something told me you'd swing by the alley."

Sam finally managed to somewhat catch her breath. "We have to find Tucker." She attempted to move past him, but he stopped her and shook his head.

"No." He scooped her up into his arms and took off into the sky before she even had a chance to argue with him. They didn't fly long and, before she knew it, they were touching down in her bedroom. "Stay here," he commanded, setting her down.

She took a step forward. "But—"

He ignored her, flying up and phasing through the ceiling. She blew out a sharp breath of air and nervously shuffled her hands through her hair. She had been in danger before, but that particular experience shook her up quite a bit.

She stripped off her jacket and flopped down onto her bed, gazing up at the ceiling. With each minute that crawled by, her patience and concern grew larger. What if the guy circled around and somehow ran into Tucker?

A wave of guilt washed over her just then. She was the one who encouraged him to knock on the door, so in a way, this was her fault. She grabbed one of her pillows and moved it over her face, groaning loudly into it as she waited.

Finally, about fifteen minutes of worrying later, Danny and Tucker phased into her room. She abruptly got up from her bed and rushed over to them, eyes wide. "Dude, what happened?" she demanded, her concern suddenly replaced with frustration.

"Well, I was on my way to your house to see if you made it home, but that creepy guy was patrolling the park. I couldn't really slide by him, but luckily, Danny found me," Tucker explained. He held up his camera, grinning. "The camera was still rolling during all of that, so I got the entertaining content I was looking for."

Sam gaped at him. "Entertaining?" She slowly advanced towards him, a stony glare carving her features. "Entertaining? What's so entertaining about being chased by a psychopath with a knife?"

Danny quickly slid in-between her and Tucker and held up his hands. "Whoa, Sam. Relax. Look on the bright side. You're both here and alive."

That momentarily calmed her, so she backed away from Tucker with a nod of her head. "Fine, but there's no way that video is being uploaded to the internet. Are you trying to make that guy even more upset with us?"

Silence, and then Tucker smacked his lips. "See, I didn't think about that."

"You didn't think about any of this," Danny muttered.

"So then, what do I do about my prank content?" Tucker asked, flat out disregarding his friend's remark. "That was quality footage! I mean, sure, I have other ding dong ditch footage, but none of those even compare to the one we just captured."

Sam pinched the bridge of her nose with a frustrated sigh. "First of all, that prank you just pulled wasn't funny. It was dangerous, Tucker. You shouldn't want that on the internet."

Danny nodded. "Besides, there are other pranks you can pull that don't result in angry people chasing you with weapons. The best thing you guys can do for tonight is lay low and take a breather."

Tucker appeared disappointed by that piece of advice, as his shoulders wilted in response. "Oh." He started to pout, but it was short-lived. "Unless..." Sam and Danny raised an eyebrow, so he took this as a sign to continue. "How about, and hear me out, we ding dong ditch this neighborhood, but with Danny Phantom just in case."

The room fell silent, as Danny and Sam both incredulously stared at their best friend. When Sam's expression melted into a glare, Danny walked up to Tucker and grabbed him by the back of his shirt. "Okay, that's it. I'm taking you home, and I'm also taking your camera."

"What? No!" Tucker exclaimed, raising his camera away from Danny. Sam, who was on that side, snatched the device out of his hand and held it away from him.

"It's for your own good," she told him. "You'll get this back when you find something decent to record."

Danny held onto Tucker and started to fly upward, bidding his female friend a goodnight before going intangible. Tucker, on the other hand, wasn't having it.

"Wait! Stop! I need her!" Sam thought he was referring to her at first, but she wasn't surprised when she discovered that he was talking to his camera. "Jennie, don't worry! Daddy's coming back for you soon!" he declared.

Sam face-palmed.